By Saio Marrah
The United States Ambassador, David Reimer has awarded eight communities lead project organisations with the Ambassador’s Special Self-Help (SSH) grant totalling $ 40,000 (forty-thousand) to support economic development in the country.
Formal presentation of the grant took place at the United States Embassy in Freetown last Wednesday..
The communities were selected from over 100 (one hundred) applications and had already commenced work as the first phase of the funds had been disbursed.
Seven districts in the East, North, South and Western Area are where the project is being implemented.
The provision of clean water, campaigns promoting hygiene best practices to reduce the risk of waterborne diseases, agricultural programmes in rural communities, and support to adolescent girls and women with limited economic opportunities, through skills- training form the thrust of the funding.
The projects focus on income generation and food security through aquaculture, rice cultivation, plantain and banana cultivation and grain store construction.
In his statement, the U.S Ambassador, told the beneficiaries that “the Ambassador’s special self-help fund is one way the U.S. Embassy supports economic development in Sierra Leone’’, and that they do so by working directly with the grassroot leaders.”
He added:“This is one of my favourite programmess because it allows us to respond directly to community requests and to fund projects that have an immediate impact on communities in Sierra Leone. The key is that they are Sierra Leonean lead development projects, and we would like to see more of those in future.”
According to him, the projects will significantly be impacted on the community people as they have been hardly hit by diseases, floods, the effect of climate change, rising prices and other economic hardships.
He said he was happy that the U.S Embassy can help cushion the impacts of these events through the good work of the organisations selected.
The Executive Director of Goodwill Humanitarian Foundation Sierra Leone, Ambassador Tejan Ishaq Kamara, spoke about their project is situated at Kamanda Farm community, close to the Fourah Bay College (FBC) Campus which he said is geared towards promoting the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) six, related to water and sanitation.
Their project, he went on has seen the rehabilitation of two community bore holes and that its direct beneficiaries are some 2,000 (two thousand) people at the Kamanda Farm, Cold Water and Black Hall Road communities.
He also spoke of people that are considered indirect beneficiaries in the region of 1,000 (one thousand) that include students residing at hostels, at FBC.
Kamara said the impact of climate change is a major concern in those communities as all the boreholes have dilapidated, and that majority of the people in those communities usually throw “garbage” which when it rains, contaminates the water, with all the probability of water- borne diseases.
Upon the completion of the water system he said the community people will be required to pay a small fee for use, that will go into maintenance of the facility.
Kamara said the community stakeholders have already set up a bank account for safekeeping of proceeds.
Coordinator for Tabomnya Soap Making Project, Jonathan Gbakewa, informed Politico that this is the second time they are receiving such grant from the U.S. Embassy.
He said they embark on production of laundry soap in Tabomnya community in the Karene District that will be upgraded with the use of machines to make soap.
He said the project will not only help in promoting the health of the community people, it will also raise revenue for their homes, and bring cohesion amongst the community people.
Copyright © 2022 Politico Online
